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Henry k Sienkiewicz 



The author of "Quo Vadis. 



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BOSTON: 

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 

1898. 



Copyright, 1897, by Little, Brown, and Company. 



A NEW BOOK BY- THE AUTHOR OF "QUO VADl 




MANIA. Translated from the Polish of Henryk 
Sienkiewicz, author of "With Fire and Sword," 
"The Deluge/' "Quo Vadis," etc., by Jeremiah Curtin. 
With portrait. Crown 8vo. Cloth. $2.00. 

3032 

Hania, the new volume by Henryk Sienkiewicz, has been 
carefully translated from the Polish by Jeremiah Curtin, w 
translations of " Quo Vadis," " With Fire and Sword," and 
other writings of Sienkiewicz, have been so highly commender 
their spirit and faithfulness by scholars and critics throughout 
country. It is uniform in size and binding with Mr. Curtit 
lations of "Quo Vadis" and other books by Sienkiewicz, and 
contains a portrait of the author and his daughter, reproduced in 
photogravure from a photograph taken last summer in the Car- 
pathian Mountains. The volume comprises over 500 pages, a 
one third being occupied by the story which gives the book its 
title, " Hania." It is a story of strength and tenderness and pow- 
erful characterization, its scene being laid in Poland. In addition 
to " Hania," the volume includes the author's latest story-, " On 
the Bright Shore," a romance of Monte Carlo; a philosophical 
religious story of the crucifixion entitled " Let Us Follow K 
which suggested to Sienkiewicz the idea of writing " Quo Vac 
a sketch entitled " Tartar Captivity," the germ of " With Fire and 
Sword," and the other volumes of the great historical trilog 
humorous novelette entitled "That Third Woman," etc. 

The new book by the distinguished Polish writer is of g 
interest and power, and will doubtless have a wide sale. V 
the volumes previously issued it gives in a series of admit 
translations a practically complete set of the novels and roma 
of Sienkiewicz. 






ffenryk Sienkiewicz. 



IN an age when of making books there is no end, when 
mere cleverness is often a drug upon the literary market, 
at rare intervals there has appeared in the world of letters, 
unheralded by any trumpet- blast of fame, a personality 
marked and unique, whose genius and merits are of so tran- 
scendent an order that they dominate literature, and without 
effort or self-seeking win for themselves foremost rank in the 
great republic of letters. 

Such a personality is Henryk Sienkiewicz. It is seven 
years since the first work in his now celebrated Trilogy of 
historical romances was offered to the American public. 1 Its 
translator was as modest as its author ; and though the work 
is in some respects a greater one than " Quo Vadis," it did not 
win that immediate popularity which the Neroic romance has 
achieved. Beyond an able review here and there, the book 
did not excite comment in any great degree, or awake a 
marked amount of curiosity with regard to its author. This is 
not hard to understand, when we remember that it requires a 
somewhat cosmopolitan taste to appreciate a Polish epic of 

1 " With Fire and Sword." An Historical Novel of Poland and Rus- 
sia. By Henryk Sienkiewicz. Translated from the Polish by Jeremiah 
Curtin. Boston: Little, Brown, and Company. 

" The Deluge." An Historical Novel of Poland, Sweden, and Russia. 
By Henryk Sienkiewicz. A sequel to " With Fire and Sword." Trans- 
lated from the Polish by Jeremiah Curtin. 2 vols. Boston : Little, 
Brown, and Company. 

" Pan Michael." An Historical Novel of Poland, Russia, the Ukraine, 
and Turkey. By Henryk Sienkiewicz. A sequel to " With Fire and 
Sword " and "The Deluge." Translated by Jeremiah Curtin. Boston: 
Little, Brown, and Company. 



2 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

the seventeenth century ! The mere fact that the Trilogy 
was Polish in sentiment, that Polish knights with formidable 
Slavic names and titles were its heroes, — this in itself has 
often proved sufficient to intimidate and dissuade the intelli- 
gent reader. Those, however, who have read " With Fire and 
Sword," and have with interest followed its brave knights and 
fair women through "The Deluge," and have rejoiced and 
laughed and sorrowed with Pan Michael and his Basia until 
the last tragic scene, when the curtain falls and the great soul 
of the little knight ascends to God, — readers of " Pan 
Michael" need not be told that Henryk Sienkiewicz is quite 
as great as Scott or Dumas, while in depth of tragic feeling he 
has excelled them. To a love of the chivalric and historic as 
strong as Scott's, to humor as delicious and keen as that of 
Dumas, he adds a third quality at times, — a spirituality so vast 
and tender and deep that it seizes the soul and bears it 
heavenward. It is this exaltation of thought which wins for 
Sienkiewicz a nobler niche in the Temple of Fame than be- 
longs to those who merely amuse and instruct. If this praise 
seem extravagant, let the reader turn to those last pages of 
" Pan Michael," and compare them with any elegiac ever 
written ; the praise will justify itself. 

Yet it is to the readers of " Quo Vadis " that the name of 
Henryk Sienkiewicz appeals most strongly. A work which has 
impressed the reading public as lastingly as this creates some- 
thing more than a mere passing interest in its author : behind 
such a work one strives to see the man himself, his environ- 
ment, tendencies, characteristics. And while mere person- 
alities in literature are often of most trivial and ephemeral 
value, especially when they relate to a living writer, it surely 
is no worthless task to endeavor to discover in the works of 
a great contemporary the man, as he relates himself to life 
and art, to every phase and problem of modern thought and 
feeling. 

To do this it is not necessary to descend to personalities or 
to possess in great detail the incidents of his life, but, knowing 
the general outline, to note how this relates itself harmoniously 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS? 3 

to the great background of life, — at times allowing the imagi- 
nation the liberty of filling in the meagre outline, giving it light 
and color. 

An artist, whether painter, sculptor, poet, musician, or writer 
of romance, is after all a mental picture, — a most composite 
picture of various tendencies, traditions of religion and art, 
race-conditions and environment. Through these conditions, 
and sometimes even in spite of them, his individuality, his dis- 
tinctive genius, must work and assert itself. And it is with 
these facts of his life rather than its mere detail that the biog- 
rapher or student must concern himself if he would under- 
stand the man, his message to others, and its value. 

Delightful as it is to listen to all the little personal chron- 
iclings of every- day life, to know minutely and exactly how 
many brain- tickings and heart-throbs are needed to produce 
such a work as " Quo Vadis," to know how many sleepless days 
and nights went to make the perfect picture, the faultless 
statue, the divine symphony, — yet we might know all these 
things and still the personality of the man might elude us. 

In speaking of Sienkiewicz we shall deal merely with those 
general facts which relate to his work and genius rather m 
with those belonging to his own personal history. 

And perhaps more eloquent than many a printed page is 
the face of Sienkiewicz as it looks at us in the first volume of 
"The Deluge." It is the face of a thinker, of a man who 
has lived deep, felt deep, loved and joyed and suffered. It is 
peculiarly an artist's face, stamped with the fine sensitiveness 
of temperament that belongs to such. The gaze is kindly, 
yet sad. There is nothing of that exuberance of gayety which 
shines in the countenance of Dumas Pere, or of the gentle, 
genial good-humor that speaks from Sir Walter's kindly visage. 
It is the face of a poet, of a cosmopolitan Hamlet of the 
nineteenth century, of a man who has travelled much in dis- 
tant lands, is equally at home in the Orient or the Occident, 
but has remained always of the Poles, Polish even to the fine 
finger-tips. 

Turn from the picture to the writer. What is the source of 



4 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

his hold upon his own countrymen and the reading-public 
everywhere ? 

If from the many characteristics of his work we could name 
but two, those two would stamp him at once as a great artist : 
they are the splendid vitality of his creations, and the sincerity 
and breadth of purpose which have marked all his work from 
first to last. 

At the age of thirty-six Sienkiewicz was comparatively un- 
known, and apparently content to be. When many a younger 
man would have written himself out, Sienkiewicz was still pre- 
paring for his best work. His genius has ripened slowly, 
ohne Hast, ohne East, apparently undisturbed by the pressure 
of circumstances, the treacherous and glittering quicksands 
that have swallowed up many an able young writer. He has 
never turned aside even for a moment, seduced by " that 
last infirmity of noble mind." His genius shows an orderly, 
healthy development, undisturbed by outer influences, bearing 
no evidence of any other pressure than the fine inner compul- 
sion. When he writes, it is because he has something to say 
which he can say, which must be said. He utters convictions 
and positive knowledge. He adopts fiction as the fittest 
vehicle for his thought ; but it is never fiction purely for fic- 
tion's sake he gives us, consequently his work is something 
more than pure fiction. Whether he touches upon some 
problem of art or religion or modern ethics, whether he 
deals with the history of a past epoch or the archaeological 
details of the first century, he has mastered his subject as 
as human knowledge can master it, and is able to touch and 
transfigure it with some new light. Whatever the nation or 
the era of which he writes, he is quick to discern that " tide in 
the affairs of men which taken at the flood leads on to for- 
tune ; " and having discerned that great onward movement 
mankind, he creates figures built upon so large and hero 
plan that they breast undaunted the very crest of the great 
wave of life that passes before us. 

And what he writes is given with absolute freedom from 
self-consciousness, a lucid grasp oi his subject, an easy mas* 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS." 5 

tery of its details which come only when a great creative artist 
has lived so completely in his creations that they actually exist 
for him. 

Readers of Goethe will remember how he himself, the seem- 
ingly cold and impassive Olympian, writes Charlotte Stein 
that he was at one time so absorbed in the thought of his 
own tragic creation, Mignon, that more than once he burst 
into tears, thinking of her. 

We cannot help thinking that Henryk Sienkiewicz must at 
times become as completely absorbed in his work as was the 
author of "Wilhelm Meister." 

Is it Petronius Arbiter elegantiarum he desires to introduce 
to us? Then rest assured he has dwelt with that enlightened 
pagan for many a day ; he knows the Satyricon as well as 
did any Roman of them all in the first century; he knows 
his Tacitus better than we do ; his feet have passed a thousand 
times over the ancient Roman haunts with Petronius ; watched 
the play of every rainbow tint upon his Myrrhene vase ; the 
odor of violets floats up to him from the garden of Petronius 
even while he writes ; and somewhere in its shades flitting 
to and fro like a ghostly, belated butterfly, he has sighted the 
white-armed, golden- haired Eunice ! 

Nowhere does he describe Roman life and history as though 
[) he were a Pole, a passive spectator ; he writes of things Roman 
as any Roman of them all in the first century might have 
written. It is this vividness of his art which almost misleads 
us into believing that his characters must be imaginary rather 
than historic personages. Only a very great genius can unearth 
thus the dusty chronicles of past centuries, and make its men 
and women live and breathe and speak to us. These his- 
toric characters are not mere shadows of the past, puppets or 
nullities, but very real men and women. If they have prompter 
or cue, we can discover neither; there is, perhaps, no living 
artist who has succeeded more completely than Sienkiewicz 
has done in eliminating self from the terms of that equation 
which exists between a man's life and his art. 

In an age when so much of contemporary literature con- 



6 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

tents itself with the mere chronicling of trivialities, when so 
much innocent paper is defaced by those who merely seek to 
hide behind the tangled brushwood of words a too obvious 
poverty of ideas, how does it happen that work as fine and 
strong and sincere as that of the great Polish novelist has 
grown so gradually into favor? 

In literature, the local, the timely, and the ephemeral win 
passing popularity, and achieve instant success; the greater 
the work, the more slowly, in general, does it find its public. 
The merely frothy floats upon the surface of things because of 
its inherent lightness ; great ideas sink deep, ferment slowly, 
and work their way upwards to the surface. The trivial and 
commonplace in literature and art finds a ready audience at 
every street corner ; thoughts of deep and permanent worth 
demand a richer soil, a public of ripened taste and enlight- 
ened judgment. 

" Was glanzt wird fur den Augenblick geboren, 
Das Echte bleibt der Nachwelt unverloren!" l 

Moreover, a sort of intellectual myopia — we dare not call 
it prejudice — must always obscure somewhat our view of the 
greatest of our contemporaries. Time alone adjusts the focus 
that enables us to see them as they are. 

Even so able and so just a critic as Mr. Edmund Gosse, in 
a review upon the writings of Sienkiewicz, informs us that he 
can pronounce no opinion upon " Quo Vadis/' because he 
cannot take time to read it ! 

He uses more than six pages of space to tell us what he 
does not know about the Trilogy, when he might have dis- 
missed it as he does " Quo Vadis," by stating with equal truth 
and frankness that he has not read the work he criticises. He 
prefaces his criticism of " The Deluge," by stating that Pan 
Michael takes the principal role ! — an ignorance of fact which 
at once indicates that the critic did not read " The Deli:- 
The impartial student of critical literature naturally asks, 

1 Mere tinsel glitters for a day; the True 
Tempts after-times to rapture ever-new ! 



AUTHOR OF ''QUO VADIS." 7 

" Why take time and space to review a work which the critic 
has not read? " An art critic rarely passes upon the merits 
of a picture he has never seen ! 

Mr. Gosse objects to the Polish novels because there are 
Polish names in them, and because they deal with Polish his- 
tory. With equal wisdom might a French critic object to 
Shakespeare's plays because they contain words unpronounce- 
able for a Frenchman ! Such statements may be humorous, 
but they are not critical ! 

If the author of " Quo Vadis " and "The Deluge " were an 
Elizabethan, we may be sure that Mr. Gosse would have read 
the writer whom he criticises ; but as Sienkiewicz is a contem- 
porary and a Pole, "Life is too short," Mr. Gosse tells us, — 
he cannot take time to read him ! 

If even enlightened critics in the Contemporary Review 
write a criticism from this standpoint, what must we expect 
from the Illiterati? 

And as any reader, save the Pole, must read Sienkiewicz 
through the medium of a translation, there would seem to be, 
at first sight, an additional difficulty in the way of under- 
standing him. In this connection a few words concerning 
Mr. Curtin's fine, strong translations of Sienkiewicz. Never, 
perhaps, in the history of letters was a work undertaken 
which has been more absolutely a labor of love. 

To translate any author, whether poet, dramatist, or ro- 
mancer, there must exist a certain subtle sympathy between 
the interpreter and the writer ; if this does not exist, the task 
of translation is merely labor lost. An English reader of 
Shakespeare in a French translation knows how well-nigh 
impossible it is to read a page without smiling. 

And when the task is that of translating a Polish epic into 
equivalent English, the ultimate success of the undertaking 
might seem at first questionable ; for, considering the Polish 
language itself, with its wealth of idiom, its world of distinc- 
tions, shades of expression, scarcely known to English, French, 
or German, its power of condensation, its highly inflected verb- 
forms, Latinisms, Germanisms, and Gallicisms, he must indeed 



8 HENRYK SIEKKIEWICZ. 

be a remarkable linguist who would not look aghast at the 
mere thought of attempting to translate Mr. Sienkiewicz into 
English. And when we consider the length of the Trilogy, we 
can understand that the task his translator had to face required 
energy and abilities of an exceptional order. 

And Mr. Curtin is no ordinary translator, — he is not merely 
an extraordinary linguist, but a man at home in any part of the 
world. He is familiar not merely with the idiom of the Slavic 
tongue as written, but also with its various spoken dialects ; 
his knowledge of the myths and folk-lore of many nations, his 
ethnological studies, have equipped him peculiarly for the task 
of translator. 

But he possesses a quality still more marked than any one of 
these : he is always in sympathy with his author, whose work he 
thoroughly loves and believes in. He endeavors always, where 
there is a choice of words, to give the strongest phrase, the 
one most adapted to translate just the shade of meaning he 
finds in the original : to give the reader of romance not merely 
a story, but some idea of the peculiar idiom of the Slavic 
tongue, and to preserve the individuality and color of the 
original. Sometimes it is well-nigh impossible to translate 
that idiom into equivalent English, and for that reason the 
translation often lacks the refined and attenuated nothingness 
of expression which for many readers seems inseparable from 
style. But it is this very vigorousness and glow of imagery, 
this at times barbaric splendor of metaphor, that can best 
render the original. An author who essays the calm and cold 
and merely polished forms of utterance should be translated in 
the same spirit : the author who writes at a white heat of 
thought and feeling needs a translator who can feel his 
mood. 

If an unprejudiced reader would really judge for himself the 
merits of Mr. Curtin's translations, let him compare them with 
any translation which has appeared either in French or Ger- 
man. The French translations are mostly fragmentary. The 
German are still worse, being for the greater part so ponder- 
ously and laboriously dull that one questions at times whether 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS." 9 

they are translations of Sienkiewicz ; for whatever literary sins 
may be charged to the author of " Quo Vadis," certainly dulness 
is not one of them. 

It is impossible to turn from these translations and read one 
of Mr. Curtin's without feeling at once the difference. The 
American translator has somehow contrived to feel and to 
preserve for others the peculiar genius, spirit, individuality, of 
the original. Occasionally, perhaps, something of polished 
elegance is lost by this very fidelity of treatment, but the gain 
is greater than the loss. 

He whose task is to carry to another's lips the golden goblet 
of genius, filled to overflowing, must indeed be cupbearer to 
the Gods if he never once spills a single drop ! 

The translator who attempts to interpret Henryk Sienkiewicz 
might indeed be pardoned if occasionally his work should 
lose something of the force and fire and exquisite beauty of 
the original ; but we believe that it has lost but little. 

It is perhaps matter for pardonable pride that these transla- 
tions are the work of an American, and offered for the first time 
to an American public ; for the fact is in itself a sign of that 
growing cosmopolitanism of spirit in the American common- 
wealth of letters, — that spirit which leads America to welcome 
most generously and gladly every great voice that greets her 
from across the seas, whether it come to us from England or 
France, Italy, Russia, or Poland. 

And now to speak briefly of those facts in the life of Sien- 
kiewicz which have direct bearing upon his art and genius. 

He was born at Wola Okrejska in Lithuania, in 1845. 
He comes of an old and noble family, and his instincts and 
tastes have always been those of a patrician. 

It will be remembered that Lithuania itself, though united 
with Poland since the fifteenth century, presented in some re- 
spects the characteristics of a distinct nationality, — a nationality 
even more interesting to the philologist than to the historian, 
because of its peculiar dialects, which present a more startling 
affinity to ancient Sanskrit than any other dialect known. It 
has scarcely any printed literature, but is rich in spoken dia- 



10 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

lects, in fragments of song, elegies of rare beauty tinged with 
a melancholy at once chaste and tender and profound. The 
country stretching from the Baltic southward is a land of 
great and gloomy forests which have had not a little influence 
upon the people. 

The land itself, its natural and strongly religious and politi- 
cal influences, its melancholy, have left their strong and last- 
ing impression upon him. He has a passionate fondness for 
the Lithuanian, and paints him and his surroundings most 
lovingly. 

If one would know with what wit and yet what tender- 
ness Sienkiewicz understands his Lithuanian, he will turn to 
the pages of " Fire and Sword," and read the adventures of 
that valorous knight, Pan Longin Podbibienta, the Lithua- 
nian Don Quixote, and follow him even through that last great 
scene at the siege of Zbaraj. 

" He rose and passed on. Beyond the wagons there were either 
no pickets or few, easily avoided. Now heavier rain began to fall, 
pattering on the bushes and drowning the noise of his steps. Pan 
Longin then gave freedom to his long legs, and walked like a giant, 
trampling the bushes ; every step was like five of a common man, 
the wagons every moment farther, the oak-grove every moment 
nearer, and salvation every moment nearer. 

"Here are the oaks. Night beneath them is as black as under 
the ground. A gentle breeze sprang up ; the oaks murmured 
lightly, —you would have said they were muttering a prayer : 'O 
QreatViod,' good God, guard this knight, for he is thy servant, and 
a faithful son of the land on which we have grown up for thy 
glory ! ' 

" About seven miles and a half divided Pan Longin from the 
Polish camp. Sweat poured from his forehead, for the air was 
sultry, as if gathering for a storm : but he went on, caring nothing 
for the storm, for the angels were singing in his heart. The oaks 
became thinner. The first field is surely near. The oaks rustle 
more loudly, as if wishing to say. * Wait: you are safe among us.' 
But the knight had no time, and he enters the open field. Only 
one oak stands on it, and that in the centre, but it is larger than 
the others. Pan Longin moves towards that oak. . . , 

" The Tartars rushed on Pan Longin like wolves on a deer, and 



.AUTHOR OF "QUO VADISP II 

seized him with their sinewy hands ; but he only shook himself, 
and all the assailants fell from him as ripe fruit from a tree. Then 
the terrible double-handed sword gritted in the scabbard ; and then 
were heard groans, howls, calls for aid, the whistle of the sword, 
the groans of the wounded, the neighing of the frightened horses, 
the clatter of broken Tartar swords. The silent field roared with 
all the wild sounds that can possibly find place in the throats of 
men. . . . 

" Pan Longin saw that the moment of his death was at hand, 
and he began the litany to the Most Holy Lady. 

" It became still. The crowds restrained their breath, waiting 
for what would happen. The first arrow whistled as Pan Longin 
was saying ' Mother of the Redeemer ! ' and it scratched his tem- 
ple. Another arrow whistled as he was saying ' O glorious Lady/ 
and it stuck in his shoulder. The words of the Litany had min- 
gled with the whistling of arrows ; and when Pan Longin had said 
' Morning Star,' arrows were standing in his shoulders, in his side, 
in his legs. The blood from his temples was flowing into his eyes ; 
he saw as through a mist the field and the Tartars; he heard no 
longer the whistle of the arrows. He felt that he was weakening ; 
that his legs were bending under him ; his head dropped on his 
breast. At last he fell on his knees. Then he said with a half- 
groan : * Queen of the Angels — ' These words were his last on 
earth. The angels of Heaven took his soul and placed it as a clear 
pearl at the feet of the * Queen of the Angels.' " 

It is impossible for words to describe the indefinable and 
lasting impression that chapter, quoted only in part, leaves 
upon the reader, with its intense realism, its power of con- 
densation, and that dominant note heard above all the minor 
music, the note of triumph and exaltation ! 

The student-days of Sienkiewicz were passed at the Univer- 
sity of Warsaw, and it would be interesting to learn from his 
own lips how the life of that city impressed him, when he 
entered its university, a mere youth. For it will be remembered 
that those days were troublous ones. It was a disastrous, criti- 
cal period in the history of Poland ; and inseparable from that 
history was the city of Warsaw itself, which had been identified 
with nearly every national movement against Russia. Against 
this rebellious city the strongest and severest measures had 
been adopted for the denationalization of the Pole. Even the 



12 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

use of his native tongue was forbidden at the University. 
Russians superseded Poles ; the old relations between the Uni- 
versity and the aristocracy were interrupted. There was an 
atmosphere of suspicion which every one felt. For the year 
1863 marked that Reign of Terror which did not end for 
Poland until much blood had been shed, and fortunes lost, and 
endless banishments compelled the Pole to admit the superi- 
ority of Russia. Peace was restored, but it was the peace of 
death that descended upon the unhappy country. 

In an early story of student life at KierT, Sienkiewicz presents 
a picture of student days in a Polish- Russian university, which 
is interesting chiefly because of the striking contrasts it presents 
to college life elsewhere. The attitude of the author toward 
this earlier work of his is characteristic of the man. He does 
not desire that it should be translated, or offered to an Ameri- 
can public, because he does not consider it his best work. 

When he was twenty-two, after he had left the University, 
began those wanderings which have influenced not a little 
his work and genius, — that restlessness, and desire for strange 
scenes and faces, and a thoroughly nomadic life. This gypsy- 
life was the very tonic most needed for his genius. It must 
be remembered that between the Polish aristocrat and the 
mere bourgeois or peasant is a gulf so profound and fixed that 
each class is comparatively ignorant of the other. Sienkie- 
wicz has lived among both classes. In his wanderings there 
is scarcely a corner of Poland that he has not explored. 

The various social strata of his country ; the marked contrast 
between the simplicity of that life and the culture of the 
ecclesiastic and aristocratic bodies ; the religious, poetic, art- 
istic temperament of the people. — none of these escape him. 
His sympathies and affiliations belong to no one class. If he 
depicts the Polish patrician, you feel sure that the picture is 
vivid and real. But the picture is none the less vivid if he 
describes to you the little, starved, stunted peasant, Yanko the 
Musician, with a soul too big for his battered and beaten body. 

The intense tenderness of his sympathy with life, whether it 
be of the palace or of the hovel, is one of the strongest chs 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS." 1 3 

teristics of Sienkiewicz. His own wandering life has contrib- 
uted not a little to this breadth of feeling. He has known 
material need. V^ 

His wanderings did not prevent occasional essays in the field 
of literature ; in 1872 appeared a volume of sketches from his 
pen, in the vein of Auerbach, but with a power of satire which 
the latter does not possess. 

Later we hear of Sienkiewicz editing a journal in St. Peters- 
burg. Whether this enterprise proved disastrous or not, we 
do not know ; possibly life in the capital city of the Czar did 
not appeal to the Pole. We next hear of him in France. 

In 1877 a scheme fathered by a Polish fraternity of ex- 
patriated artists and musicians took definite shape. The 
project was first discussed in Paris. Its object was no less 
than to establish in America a Polish Commonwealth and 
home, for denationalized genius. 

The fraternity, which was at last reduced to a mere handful 
of enthusiasts, set sail from Havre. Among their number were 
Count Bozenta Chlaponski, his wife Helena Modjeska, and 
Sienkiewicz. Thus the scene of his Homeric wanderings was 
transferred to America, and he appeared upon the Pacific coast, 
unheralded, unknown, yet one of the founders of a scheme 
as interesting as that transcendental one of the Brook Farm 
visionaries which has always fascinated Americans, because, 
while a part of our life, it has seemed so remote from it. 

This fraternity of Polish artists desired to found not merely 
Utopia, but Arcadia as well. They settled near Los Angeles, 
and called their settlement Anno Luni. 

Against what rocks the enterprise foundered we know not, 
but financially and in other ways it proved a failure, and 
our artists found themselves, if not in as dire straits as the 
fraternity of La Vie de Boheme, at least in circumstances 
which it required heroic energies to face. 

Little did Sienkiewicz realize, in 1877, what a home for 
Polish genius America would prove twenty years later, and 
that in the Mercantile Library of the most cosmopolitan city 
in America seventy-five copies of a work of his would prove 



14 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

insufficient to satisfy the demand in a single quarter of that 
city. 

The failure of the Polish colony proved in the long run pro- 
ductive of greater results than its success would have accom- 
plished. Modjeska turned her attention to the study of 
English, and made her American debut in " Adrienne Lecou- 
vreur " in San Francisco. Sienkiewicz embodied his experi- 
ences and impressions of America in a series of papers which 
were published in Warsaw, and attracted the attention of the 
Polish public towards their author. , 

He returned to Poland, where he has continued to reside 
a portion of the year, although much of his time is still spent 
in travel. His wife died while still young, and the loss was a 
terrible one to him. He has two children, Henryk, a boy of 
fifteen, and Vadviga, a maid of thirteen. 

Sienkiewicz is somewhat reserved and uncommunicative to 
strangers, but his voice expresses the d< tenderness, and 

his face brightens when he speaks of his children. 

In 1SS0 began that undertaking which has made him a 
household name in Poland, — the publishing of "Fire and 
Sword," "The Deluge/ 1 and " Pan Michael." They were first 
given to the world in a Warsaw journal, translations appearing 
simultaneously at Vienna and Berlin. For eighij^gais, w< 
told, the writer was at work upon them. One cannot restrain a 
smile. Imagine an American public waiting eight years for 
the completion of a work ! 

Sienkiewicz is an incessant and tireless worker. It is 
scarcely possible even to enumerate the various writings which 
have come from his pen. In America have appeared already, 
besides the Trilogy, " Without Dogma." " Children oi the 
Soil," " Quo Vadis," and two volumes o( short stories. An- 
other volume. "Hania," has been recently translated by Mr. 
Curtin : in addition to these mentioned are numerous publi- 
cations which have been translated into German, Rus- 
French, — contributions to journalistic literature, iivn 
of travel in various countries, etc. 

Warsaw, the scene of his student life, remains his favorite 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS." 1 5 

city when at home, and there he spends the winter months. 
He writes for several papers there. His summers are spent 
in wandering, but a portion of the season is passed in the 
Carpathian Mountains, where he has a summer home. 

But wherever he makes his temporary abode he is a citizen 
of the world, equally at home on the banks of the Tiber or the 
Seine, on the banks of the Dnieper or beside the Nile. 

Yet he is intensely Polish in taste, pride, and tender patriot- 
ism. This unique combination, the love of country mingled 
with the breadth of the true cosmopolitan, the reverence of the 
past mingled with a hope almost prophetic for the future,— 
these are the qualities which make his contributions to litera- 
ture of deep and permanent value. And to understand this 
thoroughly we must remember those social and race conditions 
which have developed life and art among the Poles. 

The culmination of the long struggle which finally brought 
to pass the dismemberment of Poland has left its inevitable 
impress upon the people. 

The history of this nation presents a peculiar anomaly, as 
strange as pathetic. Capable individually of the greatest 
things, brilliant in intellect and temperament, full of splendid 
and fitful energy at times, yet the Poles seem incapable of 
a series of concerted actions ; and, one time the dominant 
people among the Slavic nation, by a series of disastrous 
campaigns they have been overthrown as a race. The cause 
is easy to discover. The problems of modern statesmanship 
as recognized by the German or Russian have never been 
solved by them. A number of violent and jealous princes, 
each scheming to overthrow the other ; a nobility incapable of 
harmonizing at the critical epoch ; a peasantry fearing slavishly 
its rulers, but without love for them, — the Jews, to a certain 
extent foreigners and aliens in the country, acting as middle- 
men and intermediaries between these two classes, despising 
both and recognizing the weak features of both, — it would 
require a greater genius than has yet appeared to coalesce 
such hostile elements as these. 

Yet, in spite of the seeming indifference of the race to the 



1 6 HENRYK SIEXKIEWICZ. 

first conditions of national polity, the culmination of events 
which finally brought to pass the dismemberment of Poland, 
has left its impress upon the people. 

Yet, as the translator of " With Fire and Sword " tells us, " there 
is probably no more striking antithesis than the Poles as in- 
dividuals and the Poles as people." And although these 
geographic and political boundaries have disappeared, and the 
unhappy commonwealth has been absorbed politically by other 
nations, the peculiar genius and nationality of the people can- 
not at once assimilate with the Russian. 

What must be the modern attitude of an enlightened patriot, 
a Polish man of letters towards the present? One of profound 
sadness. If he desires to glorify his nation, the sources of his 
inspiration must be her past. The English, French, or Ameri- 
can writer of to-day writes for a public which has a certain 
faith in its own destiny and future ; but the Pole speaks to a 
conquered nation, and therefore he must appeal to a larger 
public, — he cannot remain merely a Pole. 

The bourgeois writer of fiction is satisfied to write of scenes 
and things local and temporary, because he is content with 
them ; but the expatriated Pole, the Man without a Country, 
is compelled perforce to become a citizen of the world. He 
cannot find at home or in the present his chief sources of 
inspiration. 

This perhaps accounts for the literary excursions of Sien- 
kiewicz, and for the modus operandi of his work. 

If he writes an historical romance, he must return to the 
past for his inspiration, to an age when Poland was still a 
mighty nation among nations. If he writes of modern Poland, 
it is the social, the artistic, or the individual problem he 
presents. 

Let us turn to the Trilogy, which in Poland at least is con- 
sidered his greatest work. It is, first and last, Polish in sen- 
timent, nationality, and patriotism. What Wagner has done 
for Germany in music, what Dumas did for France, and S 
for all English-speaking people, the Pole has achieved for his 
country in literature. 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS." \J 

The background against which these pictures paint them- 
selves reminds us not a little of Verestchagin, — the same deep 
feeling for nature, and a certain sadness that seems inseparable 
from the Russian and the Lithuanian temperament, tears fol- 
lowing closely upon mirth. It would be difficult to imagine a 
more powerful plea for peace than that which speaks to us 
from the pages of " Fire and Sword." 

This first novel of the series describes the Cossack invasion 
of the Polish Commonwealth under Helmnitski, 1647-1651. 
The novel ends with the description of the siege of Zbaraj ; 
an epilogue relates briefly the story of the battle of Berestechko, 
the triumph of the Poles, and the overthrow of Helmnitski. 

"The Deluge " opens with the year 1655, and deals mainly 
with the events of the Swedish invasion of Poland. Peace was 
concluded in 1657. "The Deluge" ends with the expulsion 
of the Swedes from the Polish Commonwealth. 

In " Pan Michael " we have the events of the Turkish Inva- 
sion of Poland, terminating with the siege of Kamenyets : the 
Epilogue narrates subsequent events, the battle of Hotin, 1674, 
and the final triumph of Poland under SobieskL 

These, in brief, are the themes of the series, but interwoven 
with these are others impossible to detail or even mention 
here. 

To attempt to give in a few words any idea of this wonder- 
ful work is impossible ; reading alone can do that. The dimen- 
sions of the background against which these figures paint 
themselves is the first characteristic that strikes the reader. 
The work is constructed upon the heroic plan. 

Mingled with this breadth and boldness of background is a 
faithfulness even in the minutest details of action. The narra- 
tive is brilliant, graphic, incisive, the interest sustained unto 
the last. The dialogue never halts. Wit, tenderness, pathos, 
speak to us from every page, making the work a supreme 
miracle of genius. The dramatic and the aesthetic sense 
blend in an intense, vital realism, — not that of the morgue or 
the dissecting-table, but the deep, abiding realism of the 
ever- human ! ) 



1 8 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

There are utterances and incidents in this work as dramatic 
as Shakespeare himself. 

The genius stamped upon the Trilogy is profoundly origi- 
nal, never merely imitative. All the forces of nature have 
helped to make it what it is. Fire, feeling, large humor, pro- 
found pathos, a deep reverence for the forms and spirit of 
true religion, — these are but a few of the most striking charac- 
teristics of this work. 

Perhaps no quality in these novels impresses us more than 
those marvellous descriptions of action, of conflict. Let the 
reader turn to the description of the siege of Zbaraj. In swift 
lightning flashes, scene after scene, incident upon incident, is 
depicted. The swing, the onward sweep, the rhythm of the 
whole is indescribable. It reminds one of passages of the 
Old Testament in its poelic fire, its absolute literalness. 

The warriors fight, love, hate ; they embrace each other ; 
they laugh ; they weep in each other's arms ; give each other 
sage counsel with elemental, truly Homeric simplicity. They 
are deep versed in stratagems of love and war, — these knights 
of the seventeenth century. They have their Nestor, their 
memnon, their great Achilles sulking in his tent. Sometimes, 
in spite of their Polish titles and [ ad a tenderness of na- 

ture almost feminine, they remind us of the good stout Saxons 
Shakespeare knew ; especially where Zagloba relates his heroic 
deeds, there is a delieiously Palstaffian strut in the performance, 
and there runs riot a Falstaitian imagination truly sublime. 

A vast, moving panorama is spread before us : 
mighty armies ; hetman and banneret go by, and Polish 
women with white souls, and fair, flowerlike faces. The scene 
is full of stir, life, action : it is constantly changing., so that at 
times we are almost bewildered, attempting to follow the 
quick suecession of events. We are transported in a moment 
from the din and uproar of a beleaguered town to ti 
solitude ot the vast steppes : yet it is always the Polish 
Commonwealth that the novelist paints for us, and 
every other music rises the wild Slavic music, rude, rhyth- 
mical, and sad. 



AUTHOR OF "QUO VADIS" 1 9 

In "Without Dogma" 1 is presented quite another theme, 
treated in a fashion strikingly different. Leon Ploszowski be- 
longs unmistakably to our own times. His doubts and dilet- 
tanteism are our own. His fine aesthetic sense, his pessimism, 
his self-probings and weariness, his overstrung nerves, his whole 
philosophy of negation, — these are qualities belonging to this 
century, the outcome of our own age and culture. 

The character of the woman stands out in splendid contrast 
to the man's. Its simplicity, strength, truth, and faith are the 
antidote for his doubt and weakness. Her very weakness be- 
comes her strength. Dogma and action, not doubt and inac- 
tivity, can save a soul. In "Quo Vadis " we have the Christian 
maiden of the first century, triumphant in her faith, dwelling 
even in the very House of Caesar, unsullied, untouched by the 
shamelessness of pagan Rome. 

In " Without Dogma " we have the modern Christian woman 
as she relates herself to the most vital questions of the day ; 
against this woman and her healthy dogmatic faith, arguments, 
sophistries, pessimism, and unbelief are powerless; she en- 
dures a thousand martyrdoms ; her heart is torn by conflicting 
emotions; she loves, suffers, dies. But Sienkiewicz bids us 
believe that whatever the emergency, her conscience is an 
unerring light. Her faith and constancy never waver. 

In "Children, of the Soil" 2 we have a very modern study, 
and the social problem strongly stated. The main questions 
the writer presents, briefly stated, are these : Granted that 
there are secret forces of evil at work within modern society, 
forces tending towards its disintegration, how combat them? 
What is the ultimate safeguard and hope of society itself? 

Sienkiewicz answers both questions in his own fashion, and 
according to his deepest conviction and faith. He believes 
that purity has a stronger, more lasting sway over men's souls 
than vice, and 

1 " Without Dogma." A Novel of Modern Poland. By Henryk 
Sienkiewicz. Translated from the Polish by Iza Young. Boston : Lit- 
tle, Brown, and Company. 

2 " Children of the Soil." By Henryk Sienkiewicz. Translated from 
the Polish by Jeremiah Curtin. Boston : Little, Brown, and Company. 



20 HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

" If Virtue feeble were 
Heaven itself would stoop to her ! " 

One word regarding the characters of Sienkiewicz. They 
have the divine breath of life in them. Whether he describes 
elemental natures, or the fine product of our nineteenth-century 
complex culture and civilization, his men and women live, 
speak, and act. They have souls as well as bodies. Their 
moods are akin to our own. 

A last word concerning the women of Henryk Sienkiewicz. 
We know of no one, except perhaps Shakespeare or Goethe, who 
has drawn so many and such varying types ; and we know of 
no one, except Shakespeare, who in his delineation of woman 
has so deeply fathomed her soul, — sounded her human heart 
and its mystery. 

This is a quality in an author which cannot soon be for- 
gotten. There is only one type of woman our author eschews, 
or, if he describes her at all, does so from a standpoint which 
leaves no doubt as to his own convictions. 

The type of femininity which appeals most strongly to the 
writers of the Decadence is the only type which he describes 
but rarely ; and when he does no glamour lingers about the 
picture, it is no "Tragic Idyll " he depicts. 

The woman Henryk Sienkiewicz loves to depict is she who 
loves, who blesses, who gathers her children about her fireside, 
— who wedded retains her virginal purity of soul. Of him 
may be said what Pierre Loti says of his hero's love for the 
only incomparable woman. " II adorait le je ne sais quoi qui 
6tait en elle, qui etait son ame !" (" In her he adored that 
inexpressible Something — her soul ! ") 

No greater tribute can be paid him than to remember the 
tribute his genius has paid true womanhood. The creator of 
Panna Olenka, of Aniela, o\ Basia, may certainly clasp hands 
across the centuries with him who gave us Imogen and Beatrice 
and Rosalind ! 



OPINIONS 

OF' 

CRITICS AND WRITERS 

ON 

THE NOVELS OF SIENKIEWICZ 

AND 

MR. CURTIN'S TRANSLATIONS. 



\ 



if 



Quo l/gdis" 



" Gf intense interest to the whole Christian civilization, — Chicago Tribune. 

" Quo Vadis." A Narrative of the Time of Nero. By 
Henryk Sienkiewicz, author of " With Fire and Sword," 
"The Deluge," etc. Translated from the Polish by Jeremiah 
Curtin. Crown 8vo. Cloth, $2.00. 

One of the greatest books of our day. — The Bookman, 

In all respects a surpassing work of fiction. — New York Herald. 

His understanding of the Roman heart is marvellous. — Boston 
Transcript. 

One of the strongest historical romances that have been written in the 
last half century. — Chicago Evening Post. 

Absorbingly interesting, brilliant in style, imposing in materials, and 
masterly in their handling. — Providence M 

The portrait of Petronius is alone a masterpiece of which the greatest 
word-painters of any age might be proud. — Philadelphia Church Standard. 

A book to which no review can do justice. A most noble historical 
romance, in which the reader never for a moment loses interest. — 
Detroit Free Press. 

One of the most remarkable books of the decade. It burns upon the 
brain the struggles and triumphs of the early Church. — Boston Daily 
Advertiser. 

With him we view, appalled, Rome, grand and awful, in her last 
throes. The picture of the giant Ursus struggling with the wild animals 
is one that will always hold place with such literary triumphs as that of 
the chariot race in "Ben Hur." — Boston Courier. 

The world needs such a book at intervals, to remind it again of the 
surpassing power and beauty of Christ's central idea. ... A climax [the 
scene in the arena] beside which the J\. t race in u Ben Hur " 

seems tame. — Chicago Tribune. 

Every chapter in it is eloquent with meaning. . . . The feasting at 
the imperial palace, the contests in the arena, the burning of Rome, the 
rescue of Lygia, the Christian maiden, — will hold their place In memory 
with unfading color, and are to be reckoned among the significant tri- 
umphs of narrative art. — T : :e Boston I 

Without exaggeration it may be said that thi it novel. 

It will become recognized bv virtue of its own merits as the one h< 
monument built by the modern novelist above the ruins of decadent 
Rome, and in honor of the blessed martyrs of the early Church. There 
are chapters in "Quo Vadis" so convincing, so vital, so absolute, that 
by comparison Lew. Wallace's popular book seems tinsel, while Ware's 
honest old " Aurelian" sinks into insignificance. — Brooklyn Ea^U. 

2 



With Fire and Sword. 

The only modern romance with which it can be compared for fire, sprigktlu 
?it;ss, rapidity of action, swift changes, and absorbing interest is u The Three 
Musketeers'''' of Dumas. — New York Tribune. 

With Fire and Sword. An Historical Novel of Poland 
and Russia. By Henryk Sienkiewicz. Translated from the 
Polish by Jeremiah Curtin. With photogravure portrait of 
the author. Crown 8vo. Cloth, $2.00. 

" With Fire and Sword " is the first of a trilogy of historical romances 
of Poland, Russia, and Sweden. Their publication has been received 
throughout the United States by readers and critics as an event in 
literature. Action in the field has never before been described in any 
language so briefly, so vividly, and with such a marvellous expression 
of energy. The famous character of Zagloba has been described as 
"a curious and fascinating combination of Falstaff and Ulysses." Charles 
Dudley Warner, in " Harper's Magazine," affirms that the Polish author 
has in Zagloba given a new creation to literature. 

Wonderful in its strength and picturesqueness. — Boston Courier. 

A romance which, once read, is n#t easily forgotten. — Literary World, 

One of the noblest works of historical romance ever written. — The Pilot, 

One of the most brilliant historical novels ever written. — Christian Union, 

A tremendous work in subject, size, and treatment. — Providence Journal. 

Not a tedious page in the entire magnificent story. — Boston Home 
Journal. 

The force of the work recalls certain elements of Wallenstein. — 
Boston Journal. 

The first of Polish novelists, past or present, and second to none now 
living in England, France, or Ger?nany. — Blackwood } s Magazine. 

He exhibits the sustained power and sweep of narrative of Walter 
Scott and the humor of Cervantes. — Philadelphia Inquirer. 

The word painting is startlingly like some of the awesome paintings 
by Verestchagin. We do not feel over bold in saying that some of the 
character-drawing is Shakespearian. Where, outside of Shakespeare, 
can such a man as Zagloba be found? — Christian Advocate. 

A novel that like Thackeray's "Henry Esmond" or Scott's "Ivanhoe" 
can be returned to again and again. — Boston Gazette. 

Such a writer as Sienkiewicz, the Polish novelist, whose works belong 
with the very best of their class, and who has a kind of Shakesperian 
freshness, virility, and power of characterization, is sufficient to give 
dignity to the literature of a whole generation in his own country. His 
three novels on the Wars of the Polish Commonwealth, and his superb 
psychological story, " Without Dogma," form a permanent addition to 
modern literature. — - The Outlook, 

3 



The Deluge. 



It even surpasses in interest and power the same author's romance " With 
Fire and Sword." . . The whole story swarms with brilliant pictures of ' war y 
and with personal episodes of battle and adventure. — New York Tribune. 

The Deluge. An Historical Novel of Poland, Sweden, 
and Russia. By Henryk Sienkiewicz. Translated from the 
Polish by Jeremiah Curtin. A sequel to "With Fire and 
Sword." With a map of the country at the period in which 
the events of "The Deluge" and "With Fire and Sword" 
take place. 2 vols. Crown 8vo. Cloth, $3.00. 

" The wars described in * The Deluge/ " says the translator, u are the 
most complicated and significant in the whole career of the Common- 
wealth." The hero of the book, Pan Andrei Kmita, is delineated with 
remarkable power; and the wonderful development of his character — 
from the beginning of the book, when his nature is wild and untamed, 
to the end, when he becomes the savior of the King and the Common- 
wealth after almost unequalled devotion and self-sacrifice — gives this 
great historical romance a place even above u With Fire and Sword." 

Wonderfully vivid and life-like. — Congregatiotialist. 

Marvellous in its grand descriptions. — Chicago Inter-Ocean, 

The greatest living writer of the romance of incident. — Boston Courier. 

One of the direct anointed line of the kings of story-telling. — 
Literary World. 

Has the humor of a Cervantes and the grim vigor of Defoe. — Boston 
Gazette. 

A really great novelist. ... To match this story one must turn to the 
masterpieces of Scott and Dumas. — Philadelphia Press. 

Pan Michael 

No word less than "Excelsior" will justly describe the achievement of the 
trilogy of novels of which u Pan Michael" is the last. — Baltimore American. 

Pan Michael. An Historical Novel of Poland, Russia, 
and the Ukraine. By Henryk Sienkiewicz. Translated from 
the Polish by Jeremiah Curtin. A sequel to "With Fire and 
Sword " and " The Deluge." Crown Svo. Cloth, $2.00. 

This work completes the great Polish trilogy. The period of the 
story is 166S-1674, and the principal historical event is the Turkish inva- 
sion of 1672. Pan Michael, a favorite character in the preceding stories, 
and the incomparable Zagloba figure throughout the novel. The most 
important historical character introduced is Sobieski, who was elected 
king in 1674. 

4 



Pan Michael {continued). 

The interest of the trilogy, both historical and romantic, is splen- 
didly sustained. — The Dial. 

A great novel. It abounds in creations. It is a fitting ending to a 
great trilogy, —a trilogy which teaches great lessons. — Boston Advertiser. 

May fairly be classed as Homeric. — The Boston Beacon. 

There is no falling off in interest in this third and last book of the 
series ; again Sienkiewicz looms as one of the great novel writers of the 
world. — The Nation. 

From the artistic standpoint, to have created the character of Zag- 
loba was a feat comparable with Shakespeare's creation of Falstaff and 
Goethe's creation of Mephistopheles. — The Dial, 



Without Dogma. 

Emphatically a human document read in the light of a great imagination. — 
Boston Beacon. 

Without Dogma. A Novel of Modern Poland. By Henryk 
Sienkiewicz. Translated from the Polish by Iza Young. 
Crown 8vo. Cloth, $1.50. 

A psychological novel of modern thought, and of great power. Its 
utter contrast to the author's historical romances exhibits in a most 
striking manner the remarkable variety of his genius. 

A triumph of psychology. — Chicago Times. 

A masterly piece of writing. — Pittsburg Bulletin. 

Belongs to a high order of fiction. — New York Times. 

Intellectually the novel is a masterpiece. — Christian Union. 

Self-analysis has never been carried further. — Colorado Springs 
Gazette. 

Worthy of study by all who seek to understand the human soul.— 
Boston Times. 

One of the most remarkable works of modern novelists. — Kansas 
City Journal. 

Bold, original, and unconventional, and displays the most remarkable 
genius. — Boston Home Journal. 

In her beautiful simplicity, her womanly strength and purity, the 
woman stands forth, Beatrice-like, in strong contrast to the man. — Balti- 
more American. 

Both absorbing and instructive. Distinctly a notable contribution to 
the mental and ethical history of the age. — Boston Courier. 

5 



Children of the Soil 



A great novel, suck as enriches the reader's experience and extends his mental 
horizons. One can compare it only with the great fictions of our great day, and 
in that comparison find it inferior to very few of the greatest. — W. D. Howells 
in Harper's Weekly. 

Children of the Soil. Translated from the Polish of 
Henryk Sienkiewicz, by Jeremiah Curtin. Crown 8vo. 
Cloth, $2.00. 

" Children of the Soil/' a novel of contemporary life in Poland, is a 
work of profound interest, written with that vividness and truthful pre- 
cision which have made the author famous. The great question of the 
book is, What can a good and honorable woman do to assist a man in 
the present age in civilized society? The question is answered thor- 
oughly in " Children of the Soil." 

A work of the very first order . . . which posterity will class among 
the ckefs-d'osuvre of the century. In this romance are manifested the 
noblest and rarest qualities that an author can possess : a wonderful 
delicacy of psychological analysis, an incomparable mastery of the art 
of painting characters and morals, and the rare and most invaluable 
faculty of making the characters live in the printed page. — Le Figaro, 
Paris, May 4, 1895. 

There is not a chapter without originality and a delightful, honest 
realism. — New Haven Evening Leader. 

It must be reckoned among the finer fictions of our time, and shows 
its author to be almost as great a master in the field of the domestic 
novels as he had previously been shown to be in that of imaginative his- 
torical romance. — Chicago Dial. 

Few books of the century carry with them the profound moral sig- 
nificance of the "Children of the Soil," but the book is a work of art 
and not a sermon. Every page shows the hand of a master. — Chicago 
Chronicle. 

There are few pages that do not put in an interesting or amusing 
light some current doctrine or some fashion of the hour. — New York 
Critic. 

Not only as a finely elaborated and manifestly truthful depiction of 
contemporary Polish life, but as a drama of the human heart, inspired 
by the supreme principles of creative art, "Children of the Soil" is dc 
cidedly a book to be read and lingered over. — Boston Beacon. 

It is a book to sit with quietlv and patientlv, to read with conscience 
and comprehension awake and alert, to absorb with an open heart. — 
Providence A T ews. 

This is a narrative long but full, rich in vitality, abounding in keen 
and exact characterization. — Milwaukee Sentinel. 

6 



SHORT STORIES BY SIENKIEWICZ. 

Yanko the Musician. 

His energy and imagination are gigantesque. He writes prose epics,— 
Chicago Evening Post. 

Yanko the Musician, and Other Stories. By Henryk 
Sienkiewicz. Translated from the Polish by Jeremiah Cur- 
tin. With Illustrations by Edmund H. Garrett. i6mo. 
Cloth, extra, gilt top, #1.25. 

Contents. — I. Yanko the Musician: II. The Light-house 
Keeper of Aspinwall; III. From the Diary of a Tutor in 
Poznan; IV. A Comedy of Errors, a Sketch of American 
Life; V. Bartek the Victor. 

A series of studies of the impressionist order, full of light and color, 
delicate in sentiment, and exquisite in technical expression. — Boston 
Beacon. 

The stories are deeply intellectual. — Philadelphia Public Ledger. 

The note of patriotism, of love of home, is strong in all these stories. 
Chicago Figaro. 

Full of powerful interest. — Boston Courier. 

Models of simplicity. — Brooklyn Eagle. 

The simple story of the lighthouse man is a masterpiece. — New York 
Times. 

They have all the charm of the author's manner. — Public Opinion. 

The tale of Yanko has wonderful pathos. — Chicago Herald. 

Lillian Morris, and Other Stories. 

Lillian Morris, and Other Stories. Translated from the 
Polish of Henryk Sienkiewicz by Jeremiah Curtin. Illus- 
trated by Edmund H. Garrett. i6mo. Cloth, extra, gilt 
top, $1.25. 

Contents. — I. Lillian Morris ; II. Sachem ; III. Angel ; 
IV. The Bull-Fight. 

The reminiscence of Spain which describes a bull-fight in Madrid is 
a realistic and rather brilliant sketch, — one of the most effective ac- 
counts of the Spanish national sport one is likely to find. — Review of 
Reviews. 

"Yamyol" in this new collection is written with awful intensity and 
marvellous power. This little tale is a masterpiece of literary work, and 
its effect on the reader extraordinary. 

All the stories are remarkable. — Literary World, 

7 



Opinions regarding Mr. Curtin's Translations. 

¥¥¥¥¥¥¥ 

FfOffl th6 J have read with diligent attention all the volumes of my 
a 1 .fL nr works sent me (American Edition). I understand how great the 
/T. IvllJUl . difficulties were which you had to overcome, especially in trans- 
lating the historical novels , the language of which is somewhat 
archaic in character. 

I admire not only the sincere co7iscientiousness and accuracy -, 
but also the skill, with which you did the work. 

Your countrymen will establish your merit better than I ; as 
to me, I can only desire that you and no one else should translate 
all that I write. 

With respect and friendship, 

HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ. 

JA/jfJj plf& The translation appears to be faithful, for none of the glow 

1/t/l /j anc * v ig or of tne great Polish novelist are missing, and the 

LllliA/ work is indeed a triumph of genius. — Chicago Mail. 

O'WOf'Cl. Mr. Curtin's admirable translation of this brilliant historical 

romance may be said to have taken the literary critics of the 

day by storm. — Portland Advertiser. 

Mr. Curtin deserves the gratitude of the English-speaking 
public for his most excellent and spirited translation. We 
have to thank him for an important contribution to the number 
of really successful historical novels and for a notable enlarge- 
ment of our understanding of a people whose unhappy fate 
has deserved the deepest sympathy of the world. — Chicago 
Evening Post. 

Mr. Jeremiah Curtin shows uncommon ability in transla- 
tion; he conveys in accurate and nervous English the charm 
of the Polish original, frequently exercising much ingenuity in 
the treatment of colloquial idioms. — Literary World. 

The English-reading world cannot be too grateful to Mr. 
Curtin for rendering this masterpiece among historical novels 
into such luminous, stirring English. He has brought both 
skill and enthusiasm to his work, and has succeeded in giving 
us a thorough Polish work in English dress. — Pittsburg 
Ch ronicle Telegraph . 

Mr. Curtin's style of translation is excellent and apparently 
faithful, and he is entitled to the thanks of the English-reading 
public for revealing this new and powerful genius. — Prozidence 
Journal. 

It is admirably translated by that remarkable, almost phe- 
nomenal, philologist and Slavonic scholar, Jeremiah Curtin, so 
long a resident of Russia, and at one time secretary of legation 
there. — Brooklyn Eagle. 

8 



The 
Deluge. 



Mr. Curtin has done the translation so well that the pecu- 
liarities of the author's style have been preserved with great 
distinctness. — Detroit Tribune. 

This story, like its predecessor, has been translated from 
the Polish by Jeremiah Curtin in a way that makes its stirring 
or delightful scenes appear to have been written originally in 
English. — Brooklyn Daily Eagle. 

Too much cannot be said in praise of the conscientious and 
beautiful work of the translator. — Chatta?woga Times. 

Of Mr. Curtin's share in " The Deluge/' there are no words 
to express its excellence except "it is perfect." Fortunate 
Mr. Sienkiewicz to have such an interpreter ! Fortunate Mr. 
Curtin to have such a field in which to exercise his skill ! — 
Boston Times. 

Mr. Jeremiah Curtin has accomplished his task with that 
sympathy and close scholarship which have always distin- 
guished his labors. — Boston Saturday Evening Gazette. 

The translation is full of sympathy, of vigor, and of ele- 
gance. The translator has accomplished the difficult task of 
preserving the spirit of the original without failing in the 
requirement of the tongue in which he was writing, and the 
result is a triumph of the translator's art. He has done a 
great service to the English reader, while he has at the same 
time made for himself a monument which would cause his 
name long to be remembered, even had he no other claims 
upon public gratitude. — Boston Courier. 

P&tl ^ e fidelity of Mr. Curtin's translation to the original can 

Mirhnol ° nly be J ud & ed b ^ internal evidence. That would seem to be 
IVllOuCWI'. conclusive. The style is vigorous and striking. — Cleveland 
Plain Dealer. 

The translation is quite up to Mr. Curtin's excellence. ■— 
Brooklyn Eagle. 

Like all Mr. Jeremiah Curtin's work, the translation is 
excellent. — New York Times. 

Mr. Curtin has made his translation with that exquisite 
command of English and breadth of knowledge characteristic 
of him. — Boston Beacon. 

The translation is beyond criticism. — Boston Home Journal. 

The style of all the pieces, as Englished by Mr. Curtin, is 
singularly clear and delicate, after the manner of the finished 
French artists in language. — Review of Reviews. 

Mr. Curtin has certainly caught the verve of the original, 
and in his rendering we can still feel the warmth of the author's 
own inspiration. — New Haven Register. 

The translation from the Polish of all of Sienkiewicz's 
works has been made by Mr. Jeremiah Curtin, and it is suffi- 
cient to say that it has received the unqualified praise of 
scholars both in this country and in England. — Boston Home 
Journal. 



Children 
of the 
Soil. 



Short 
Stories. 



€< OtlO ^^ e ^ terar y world is indebted to Mr. Curtin for his 

i//J * >> admirable work. — Milwaukee Journal. 

y&U>lS. The translation is all that can be desired. It is difficult to 

conceive that the book can be more effective in its native 
tongue. — Cleveland World. 

Mr. Curtin has adequately translated the complicated plot, 
giving full scope to the imaginative qualities of the author's 
genius. — Bosto?i Herald. 

Mr. Curtin in his translation has so preserved the spirit of 
the original that in his English version almost every page is 
eloquent with meaning. — Jersey City Journal. 

Mr. Curtin's translation is of that satisfying, artistic order 
that one always expects and obtains from him. To the reader's 
thought, author and translator are one, so perfect is the mutual 
understanding, —r Boston Ideas. 

It is a good deal to be thankful for that such a book is 
made into the English language ; and for doing that so famously 
well, Mr. Jeremiah Curtin is entitled to the blessings of a 
romance-loving public. — Providence jVews. 

Mr. Curtin's English is so limpid and fluent that one finds 
it difficult to realize that he is reading a translation. In fact, 
it is so perfect that one never thinks about it until he has 
received the impression which the author intends to convey 
and begins to ask himself how the impression is made. Then, 
indeed, he perceives that he owes a debt not only to the author, 
but to the translator who has made so great a work accessible 
to him. — Philadelphia Church Standard. 

But our debt to Sienkiewicz is not less than our debt to his 
translator and friend, Jeremiah Curtin. The diversity of the 
language, the rapid flow of thought, the picturesque imagery 
of the descriptions are all his. The purity of the English, the 
accuracy of abstract expressions, the specific apposition of 
word to object is remarkable. The work would stand alone as 
a model of English prose, and might well be read with profit 
merely as an example of combined narrative and description. 
Mr. Curtin has done good work before in his translation of 
Sienkiewicz; he has surpassed himself in his Englishing of 
"Quo Vadis."— Boston Transcript. 

No brain and hand were better fitted by nature and wide 
experience to assume the task of reanimating the work of 
Sienkiewicz into English than those of Mr. Curtin. A cosmop- 
olite, but few countries in the world have escaped a prolo 
visit bv him, and indeed he is the complete and thorough 
master of seven languages. Thus equipped, and unexcelled 
as a linguist and man of letters, he has given us the unsur- 
passed translation of " With Fire and Sword,'* " The Deluge," 
" Pan Michael," and the lesser romances of Henryk Sienkiewicz 
and now the supreme effort, M Quo Vadis," a tragic romance of 
the unspeakable days of the Roman Empire under the terrible 
Nero. Here is a translation indeed 1 — Boston Courier. 

10 



An Illustrated Holiday Edition of the Greatest 
Book of the Year* 



44 



^uo Vadis." 



With Maps and Plans, a Portrait of the Author, and 
twenty-six photogravure plates. 

" Quo Vadis." A Narrative of the Time of Nero. 

Translated from the Polish of Henryk Sienkiewicz by Jere- 
miah Curtin. A new and beautiful holiday edition, printed 
from new type, with a map of ancient Rome, a map of 
the route from Antium to Rome, two plans showing Roman 
houses of the character of those of Petronius and Aulus, 
and twenty-seven photogravure plates, including original 
pictures by Howard Pyle, Evert Van Muyden, and Ed- 
mund H. Garrett, a new portrait of Sienkiewicz, and 
reproductions from ancient sculptures of Nero, Poppaea, 
etc. 2 vols. 8vo. Cloth, extra, gilt top, with ornamental 
cover design, each volume in cloth wrapper, and the set 
in a cloth box to match, $6.00. 

Half crushed Levant morocco, gilt top, $12.00. 

Also an Edition de Luxe, limited to 250 numbered 
copies, printed on handmade paper, with duplicate set of 
plates. 2 vols. 8vo. Parchment, gilt top, $12.00 net. 

He reveals himself a master in authorship as truly in describing an- 
cient Rome as in picturing the struggles of Poland. — Congregationalist. 

The picture here given of life in Rome under the last of the Caesars 
is one of unparalleled power and vividness. — Boston Home Journal. 

As a study of the introduction of the gospel of love into the pagan 
world typified by Rome, it is marvellously fine. — Chicago Iftterior. 

Interest never wanes ; and the story is carried through its many 
phases of conflict and terror to a climax that enthralls. — Chicago 
Record. 

It would be only commonplace praise to call it the most remarkable 
book issued this year. The purification of love by self-denial and 
suffering for Christ's sake is nobly described in a sketch that is truest 
art because it is natural and perfectly true to life. It is a book to 
read and re-read many times. — Michigan Presbyterian. 

11 



\ 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
* 

From Paintings made especially for this production 
by Harvard Pyle. 
Lygia and Vixicius in the Garden of Aulus. 
The Punishment of Chilo by Vinicius. 
Nero holding a Golden Lute, with Rome in Flames. 
" Peractum est ! " 
The Conversion of Chilo. 
"Quo Vadis, Domine!" 

From Drawings executed for the c work 
by Evert Van Muyden 
The Rescue of Lygia. 
Ursus with the Body of Croton. 
Nero's Chained Lions and Tigers, 
Petronius calming the People. 
The Struggle between Ursus and the Bull. 

From Pictures made for this publication 
by Edmund H. Garrett. 
"Crowds of People flowed past." 
Popp^a's Meeting with Lygia in Nero's Garden. 
Eunice and Iras pouring Wine in the Mouse of Petronius. 
Chilo undertaking to find Lygia. 
The Dream of Vinicius. 
Vinicius and Lygia hear Lions roaring in the Vivarium. 

From Ancient Sculptures. 

(.alba. (Capitoline Museum.) 
Otho. (Vatican.) 
Nero. (Capitoline Museum.) 
PoPPiKA. (Capitoline Museum.) 

From Paintings. 

The APPIAN Way. By ('.. Boulanger. 

The Christian Martyrs. By Francois Leon Benouville. 

Nero Persecuting the Christians. By YYilhelm von Kaulbach. 

From Photographs. 

The Mamertine Prison. 

The Chapel of Domine Quo Vadis. 

Portrait of Henrvk Siknkiewicz. 

Maps and Plans. 
Ancient Rome. 

Ancient Italy between Rome and Antium. 
Plan of a Roman House oe the Character of that of 

Petron us. 
Plan of a Roman House, similar to that of Aulus 
Plautius. 

LITTLE, BROWN, & COMPANY, Publishers, 

254 Washington Street, Boston, Mass. 

12 



y 






CT^HEY satisfy as, perhaps, no other books have satisfied, the 
* dual prerequisites of the historical novel. They possess at 

On 

, . -uraey and vitality. They present a faithful picture of 

. a ^tace, manners > ideas, and emotions selected for dclin- 

, jtd at the same time they conform to the deep lines of 

. hture and exhibit human beings in lifelike speech and 

/ 'ninJ- There is a remarkable variety of types, masculine and 

hi xam e ^°tvedupon the author's canvas ; and some are as nota- 

/ the )ptes of the pressure of circumstances upon character and 

have hel c *P roca l influence of character upon environment as 

^n described in any work of fiction. There are battle 

tror fid peaceful scenes ; there is humor and there is pathos ; 

Vke se nc * m * r th * the horrors of massacre and the Sabbath- 

.»: jj enity of religious resignation. There are masters of 

^brommiatecraft and political duplicity that recall Richelieu and 
Mazarin, but yet have set upon them a distinctive Polish mark; 
there are great captains not unworthy to be pupils of their con- 
temporary, -Gustavus Adolphus; there are knights of a desperate 
valor and an unselfish devotion, who seem to have stepped forth 
from the romances of the age of chivalry ; there are Don Quixotes 
and Sancho Panzas, cast, however, in a Polish, not a Castilian, 
mould; and there is a unique personage, Zagloba, who figures 
in all of the novels, and who has in him a great deal of Falstaff, 
a touch of Thersitesy and a gleam of Ulysses. 

New York Sun. 



CURTIN'S POPULAR FOLK-LORE ST 



L MYTH'S AND FOLK-LORE OF IRELAND. 
Curtin* With etched Frontispiece* Crown 8 vo» 
$2.00. 

Mr. Curtin needs no introduction to the lovers of Gaelic 
11 He has approved himself," says Mr. Alfred Nutt, "the fo 
Irish oral literature, and has brought together an amount of ma 
intrinsic interest, holds its own by the side of Campbell of Islay's 
of the West Highlands. 7 " 

May justly be ranked with the best recent collections of popular 
France, and Italy. . . . A delightful book alike for the scholar and 
— The Nation. 

I compliment you most heartily upon the book. // is wonderfully 
festive. Fin MacCool and the Fenians of Erin were great fellows, 
A. Dana. 

IL MYTH AND FOLK -TALES OF THE R 
ERN SLAVS, AND MAGYARS. By 
Crown 8vo. Cloth, gilt top, $2.00. 

Fascinating to both the student and the general reader, to young an 
Boston Gazette. , „ . , 

Grown-up children, as well as hunters after folk-lore and supersti 
ihese freaks of fact and fancy, which Mr. Curtin translates and d 
Prof. F. J. Child. - The Critic. 



ni. 



3y Jr remiah 




HERO -TALES OF IRELAND, 
8vo. Cloth, gilt top, $2.00. 

Whether as a collection of marvellous stories or as material for the 
ologist, this is one of the most valuable contributions to folk- 
recent years. — The Critic. 

IV. TALES OF THE FAIRIES and of the Ghost- 7 

from Oral Tradition in Southwest Munster. By Jeremiah 
Curtin. 12mo, cloth, $1.25. 

CUMIN'S TRANSLATIONS FEOM ZAGOSKDT. 
TALES OF THREE CENTURIES. By Michael Zagoskin. ("An 
Evening on the Hopyor," "Kuzma Roscnm," and "The Three 
Suitors.") Translated from the Russian by Jeremiah Curtin. 
J6mo. Cloth, $1.00. 
Those who are interested in stories of a ghostly character will find in the first 
portion of this volume some Very remarkable specimens. 
Master puces of consist narration. — Boston Beacon. 



LITTLE, BROWN, & COMPANY, Publisher*, 

254 Washington Street, Boston. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




00027104b7fl 



